Inflation rose to 6.8% in July : CBSL

COLOMBO (News 1st): The Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) reports that inflation rose to 6.8% in July 2021, as opposed to July 2020, when inflation rose to 6.1%. In a statement, the CBSL denotes that the reason for this is the monthly increases of prices of items in both food and non-food categories. Accordingly, Food inflation increased to 11.0 per cent in July 2021 from 9.8%in June 2021 and Non-Food inflation increased to 3.2% in July 2021 from 2.9% in June 2021. The CBSL said that within the Food category, prices of sugar, vegetables, dried fish and fresh fish increased whereas, prices of coconut and coconut oil recorded decreases. Moreover, prices of items in the Non-Food category recorded an increase mainly due to price increases observed in the Transport (Petrol and Diesel) and Restaurant and Hotels sub-categories during the month. Further, year-on-year core inflation increased to in 4.4 per cent July 2021 from 4.1 per cent in June 2021, while annual average core inflation remained unchanged at 4.4 per cent in July 2021.